Fifth Time In Costa Rica, 6

It`s been quite an uneventful and inauspicious kind of day, so far. The worst thing that´s happened is that I left my pencil sharpeners in the breakfast room and didn`t find out till I took out my sketchbook and pencil crayons in a cafe where I sat to rest with a cold drink, following a good ten mile walk in the sun. Pardon the run on sentence, but it`s kind of how my brain is working today. While I trusted the people at the bed and breakfast to take care of the pencil sharpeners for me, I still thought it prudent to buy one in the drugstore in Santa Elena. I suppose the most significant thing that happened was the incredibly long walks (I must have covered at least fifteen miles today) and the beautiful weather today, as well as more incredibly lovely birds I saw. In this case two species of oriole: a yellow backed oriole, and a troupial. You will have to ask Uncle Google for images if you want to see for yourself. This area is full of tourists right now and I hear a lot of English being spoken. I had some interesting chats over breakfast today and yesterday with two women from the US. Both, or one of them anyway, are Quakers. We talked at length about the dreadful state of the world, but also agreed that we are optimists and we hope for the best, given how far we have come with all kinds of social, technological and political progress we have made just in the last hundred years or so, so we are hoping that our best angels will be summoned to help us through the mess that is coming, and that we are already in. Whoops! Another run on sentence. Oh well! But really, Gentle Reader, it is amazing some of the obstacles our species has survived, including the Ice Age which nearly wiped us out! Now we have only to hope that our dear Mother Earth is going to survive us. I understand that they are naming this new epoch we are in and it is going to be called the Anthropocene, or the epoch of humans, because we have done so much to change and alter this planet, and not always for the better. Then I had a long chat in Spanish with the manager here, who is the eldest son of the owners Really nice fellow, and although his English is fluent, he is always glad to accommodate me in Spanish. While I know that it isn`t fair to generalize, I do find American and Canadian, Australian and New Zealander visitors to be all equally friendly, and usually quite pleasant to chat with. Also other Latinos, and Spanish people too. British people, sometimes yes, sometimes no. French and German travelers all seem to have a pole stuck up their backsides and it often feels like an imposition just saying hi to them and they often seem to be quite surly and almost downright miserable, but I understand that some western Europeans tend to be like that, unfortunately. Everyone else, including Dutch and Scandinavians, I`ve found to be pretty chill and easy going. Japanese too, but there aren`t a lot of Asians here visiting, but it is nice to see them sometimes, because it makes me feel more at home, like I`m back in Vancouver, where they are very much a part of our beautiful diversity, and here I am again with yet another run on sentence, so I will quit here, Gentle Reader, before you either start snoring or want to hit me, whichever comes first. A big hug for all of you from Monteverde, Costa Rica! Bye for now.